How to write a press release
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Write a press release in six parts: a factual headline, a dateline, a one-sentence lead carrying the five Ws, two or three short body paragraphs with one quote, a boilerplate about the company, and a media contact. Write in the third person, lead with the news, and keep it to 300 to 400 words on a single page.
Start with the inverted pyramid
Newsrooms write top-heavy on purpose, and you should too. The inverted pyramid means the most important fact comes first, then the supporting detail, then the background, in descending order of importance. A journalist can stop reading at any point and still have the story. An editor can cut from the bottom up without losing anything that matters.
This is the opposite of how most founders write. They build a case, set context, and reveal the news at the end. By then the reporter has already moved on. Put the conclusion in the headline and the first sentence, every time.
The six parts of a press release
Every standard release has the same six parts. Write them in this order, and treat the section anchors below as a checklist you can follow start to finish.
Step 1: the headline
The headline is the news in one factual line, written the way a journalist would write a story title. Aim for about 12 words or fewer. Subject, verb, result. No slogans, no adjectives, no exclamation marks. If a reporter could paste your headline straight into their CMS, you have written it well.
A reliable headline formula: [Company] [does what] [with a concrete number or outcome]. Compare a weak headline, "PressPilot is excited to announce a major new milestone," with a strong one, "PressPilot passes 10,000 journalists in its database after EU expansion." The second one is the story.
Step 2: the dateline
The dateline opens the body and anchors the news in time and place. The convention is the city in capitals, then the date: PARIS, June 16, 2026. It signals to the newsroom where the announcement originates and that the news is current, which matters when a story is time-sensitive or geographically specific.
Step 3: the lead
The lede (also spelled lead) is the first sentence, and it carries the whole story. It must answer the five Ws: who, what, when, where and why. A reader who only reads this sentence should still understand the news. Write it last if you have to, but make it stand alone.
| The five Ws | What it answers |
|---|---|
| Who | The company or person making the news |
| What | The actual announcement |
| When | The date it happens or took effect |
| Where | The market, region or place |
| Why | Why it matters to a reader outside the company |
Step 4: the body with one quote
The body is two or three short paragraphs that add detail, context and proof, still in descending order of importance. Keep paragraphs to two or three sentences. Include exactly one quote, attributed to a named, titled spokesperson. One good quote carries opinion and personality that facts cannot, and reporters often lift it verbatim. Two or three quotes dilute it and read like a committee wrote the release.
Step 5: the boilerplate
The boilerplate is the fixed paragraph that describes the company, the same on every release: what it does, for whom, since when, and a link. Three or four sentences. Write it once, reuse it forever, and update it only when the facts change. It belongs after the body, marked with a short heading like "About [Company]."
Step 6: the media contact
Close with a real human contact: a name, a role, an email and a phone number. A journalist on deadline will not chase a generic press@ address. Make it effortless to reach a person who can answer a question or confirm a detail within the hour.
How long should a press release be?
A press release is 300 to 400 words, on one page. That is the rule, and it is unforgiving for a reason: a journalist decides whether to read on within the first two lines. Short announcements can run 250 words. A data-heavy release can reach 500. Past one page you are writing an article, and the news drowns.
If a journalist cannot understand your news from the headline and the first sentence alone, the release has already failed, no matter how good the rest is.The skim test
AP style notes that make a release read like news
Most newsrooms write in AP style, the Associated Press Stylebook conventions. Matching them is a small signal that you understand how news is made. The ones that come up in almost every release:
- Spell out numbers under 10, use figures for 10 and above (three offices, 12 markets).
- Write dates as Month Day, Year, and abbreviate long months in the dateline.
- Use a person's title before their name on first reference, then last name only after.
- One space after a period, not two. Avoid exclamation marks entirely.
- Stay in the third person throughout. A release is never "we," it is "the company."
- Use the percent sign with a figure (40 percent in AP, though 40% is now accepted too).
A full worked example
Here is a complete, realistic release that follows every rule above. It is around 320 words, leads with the news, runs one quote, and ends with a boilerplate and contact.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Northwind Logistics cuts last-mile delivery times 28 percent with new routing engine
LYON, France, June 16, 2026. Northwind Logistics today launched Northwind Routing, an AI-based engine that has cut average last-mile delivery times by 28 percent across its first 14 client cities, the company announced. The tool reroutes vans in real time using live traffic and order data, and is available to all Northwind shipping customers from today.
The engine was built after a two-year pilot with regional grocery and pharmacy clients, who together completed more than 4 million deliveries during the test. Northwind reports that the routing changes also reduced fuel use per delivery by 19 percent, a result it attributes to fewer empty return trips.
"Last-mile delivery is where logistics quietly loses time and money, and most teams accept it as fixed," said Claire Fontaine, chief operating officer at Northwind Logistics. "We wanted to prove it is not. A 28 percent cut is the difference between a same-day promise a company can keep and one it cannot."
Northwind Routing is available now in France, Belgium and the Netherlands, with a Germany rollout planned for the third quarter of 2026. Pricing is based on monthly delivery volume, and existing customers can switch on the engine from their dashboard at no setup cost.
About Northwind Logistics
Northwind Logistics is a European last-mile delivery company founded in 2018 and based in Lyon. It serves more than 600 retail, grocery and pharmacy clients across western Europe. Learn more at northwind-logistics.example.
Media contact
Claire Fontaine, COO, Northwind Logistics. press@northwind-logistics.example. +33 4 00 00 00 00.Sample press release, for illustration only
Common writing mistakes
Most releases fail for the same handful of reasons. Read yours back against this list before you send.
- Burying the news. The announcement appears in paragraph three, not the headline.
- Marketing language. "Leading," "innovative," "excited to announce." Reporters delete these on sight.
- First person. "We are proud" instead of the company doing something.
- Too long. Two pages of context no journalist asked for.
- No real contact. A press@ inbox no one watches on deadline.
- A vanity quote. A CEO quote that says nothing a press release could not say plainly.
Once the structure is second nature, the writing gets fast. If you would rather draft from a brief and edit instead of starting from a blank page, the PressPilot press release generator writes a first draft in this exact six-part format, which you then tighten by hand. Either way, the structure on this page is what a newsroom expects to see.
Frequently asked questions
- How do you write a press release?
- Write it in six parts and in this order: a factual headline, a dateline, a one-sentence lead with the five Ws, two or three short body paragraphs with one quote, a boilerplate about the company, and a media contact. Write in the third person, lead with the news, and keep the whole thing to 300 to 400 words on one page.
- How long should a press release be?
- One page, around 300 to 400 words. A journalist skims it in under a minute, so anything longer buries the news. Keep paragraphs to two or three sentences and put every fact that matters in the headline and the first paragraph.
- How many words is a press release?
- A standard press release is 300 to 400 words. Short announcements can run 250 words, complex ones with data can reach 500, but past one page you are writing an article, not a release. The news must survive a 20-second skim.
- What are the parts of a press release?
- Six parts: the headline (the news in one line), the dateline (city and date), the lead (first sentence with the five Ws), the body (details, context and one quote), the boilerplate (a fixed company description) and the media contact (a name and email). Every standard release follows this structure.
- How do you start a press release?
- Start with the dateline, then put the most important fact in the very first sentence: who did what, when, where and why. Do not warm up with background. The opening sentence, called the lead, should make sense as a standalone summary of the entire story.
- What is an AP style press release?
- An AP style press release follows the Associated Press Stylebook: spell out numbers under 10, use figures for 10 and up, write dates as Month Day, Year, use one space after a period, give a title before a name on first reference, and stay in the third person. Most newsrooms read AP style, so matching it makes your release feel newsroom-ready.